Forests

With 80 per cent of the planet's ancient forests already lost or degraded, the need for increased protection of the world's remaining forests is more urgent than ever. Forests help stabilize the climate, sustain life, provide jobs, and are the source of culture for many Indigenous communities. Greenpeace opposes destructive and unsustainable development in the remaining ancient forests in Canada and globally. To effect positive change and put lasting solutions in place, we challenge the global marketplace, engage consumers, pressure governments and work with industry to protect the Boreal Forest, the Great Bear Rainforest and the Indonesian rainforest.

The Great Bear Rainforest represents one quarter of the world's remaining coastal temperate rainforests. It stretches along the mainland coast of British Columbia from the Discovery Islands to the Alaska border - an area the size of Switzerland. The region is home to the rare white Spirit Bear, five species of salmon, the unique coastal wolf and magnificent cedars. It is also the unceded traditional territories of over two dozen First Nations. Once threatened with industrial logging, over the past twenty years Greenpeace, its environmental partners, and the forestry industry have worked hard with First Nations governments and the BC Government to safeguard the region to help ensure it is managed responsibly for future generations. Now 85% of the forested landbase of the Great Bear Rainforest is off limits to industrial logging.

Greenpeace campaigns to prevent the reckless destruction of Indonesia's remaining rainforests. We are doing so to protect endangered wildlife like the Sumatran tiger and orangutan, to support forest communities, and to stop greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation. One of the leading drivers of this forest destruction is Asia Pacific Resources International Limited (APRIL).

British Columbia’s Clayoquot Sound is an ecological treasure of regional, national and global significance. Its mountains, valleys and islands represent Vancouver Island’s largest intact ancient rainforest. Home to 45 known endangered, threatened and vulnerable animal species, Clayoquot’s forests are an invaluable haven for wildlife. In the early 1990s, Greenpeace joined fellow environmental groups, the region’s First Nations and the public to protect the intact old-growth rainforests of Clayoquot Sound from logging. However, despite increased protection, many of these ecologically intact areas remain unprotected and are still vulnerable to logging today.

The latest updates

It’s Monday and I am standing in a room, waiting to speak at the media conference that announces the completion of the Great Bear Rainforest Agreements – safeguarding an area of forest larger than Vancouver Island, bigger than...

At long last, today we celebrate the culmination of over twenty years of campaigning to safeguard the Great Bear Rainforest.
We started with conflict in the mid-1990s: exposing to the world through blockades, protests, and...

We are getting much closer to the end of the long and winding road that has been the Great Bear Rainforest campaign. As I mentioned in a recent blog , along the way to completing the Great Bear Rainforest Agreements we have...

The Broadback Valley Endangered Forest is under threat from logging companies that wish to divide the southern region of this magnificent, pristine forest into three parts -- with the construction of two major access roads through this...

British Columbia’s Great Bear Rainforest: Where one of the world’s largest remaining coastal temperate rainforests is also home to many, many First Nations, and which holds one of the richest and most wondrous ecosystems on Earth –...